(1) Field of Invention
The present invention relates to a system for robot supervisory control and, more particularly, to a system for robot supervisory control through the use of perception-based markers and augmented reality.
(2) Description of Related Art
Autonomous robots typically suffer from limited situational awareness. To provide autonomous control, the prior art generally relies upon the use of programming robots by defining waypoints. For example, interactive interfaces allow the specification of multiple robot arm poses. However, the limitation of this approach is that aligning a robot posture with visual input is very tedious. Moreover, rigid postures do not account for necessary adjustments to cope with uncertain contact surfaces and dynamic obstacles (such as moving objects). Another approach is to select from pre-programmed tasks; in this case, the robot cannot deal with unplanned situations, which likely occur during rescue or military operations.
For autonomous control, the state of the art is still too far away from enabling a humanoid (or similarly complex robot) to do useful tasks; thus, a human operation still needs to be involved (e.g., through teleoperation). Tele-operation is the control of a robot from a distance, such as through use of a remote control device. To provide further situational awareness to the tele-operator, such tele-operated robots often include cameras. While generally operable, many issues remain such as, inadequate resolution, lag in the video image, and lag in the mechanical and movement responses of the robot.
Thus, a continuing need exists for an improved system for robot supervisory control that enables an operator to command high-level goals, while having adaptable software to deal with an uncertain environment.